The reactants were cycled at 95 C for 1 min, 60 C for 1 min and 72 C for 90 s to enable denaturation, annealing and extension respectively. involved a novel site in domain III as well as domain V/endorepellin and the 21 integrin. In contrast, endothelial cells adhered to the protein core of perlecan in the presence of glycosaminoglycans. Smooth muscle cell perlecan bound both FGF1 and FGF2 via its heparan sulfate chains and promoted the signaling of FGF2 but not FGF1. Also endothelial cell perlecan bound both FGF1 and FGF2 via its heparan sulfate chains, but in contrast, promoted the signaling of both growth factors. Based on this differential bioactivity, we propose that perlecan synthesized by smooth muscle cells differs from that synthesized by endothelial cells by possessing different signaling capabilities, primarily, but not exclusively, due to a differential glycanation. The end result is a differential modulation of cell adhesion, proliferation and growth factor signaling in these two key cellular constituents of blood vessels. and in tumor xenografts (Bix et al., 2006; Bix et al., 2004; Willis et al., 2012; Woodall et al., 2008). Perlecan is also present Camostat mesylate in avascular tissues such as hyaline cartilage (Chuang et al., 2010; Melrose et al., 2006; Wilusz et al., 2012), intervertebral disc (Melrose et al., 2003), meniscus (Melrose et al., 2005) and synovium (Kaneko et al., 2013) which are devoid of a basement membrane. Perlecan influences cell function as it can both suppress and promote cell proliferation, has been associated with quiescent SMCs (Weiser et al., 1996) and its expression is inversely correlated with SMC proliferation and the formation of intimal hyperplasia (Kinsella et al., 2003). Perlecan is down regulated at times of maximal SMC proliferation which is within two weeks after balloon-injury of rat carotid arteries while perlecan deposition is seen in the later stages of lesion development when SMC proliferation has ceased. The HS chains that decorate perlecan contribute to the growth inhibition of SMCs (Forsten et al., 1997) as heparinase treatment of perlecan abolishes its ability to inhibit SMC proliferation (Bingley et al., 1998; Clowes and Karnowsky, 1977; Tran et al., 2004) and changes SMCs from a quiescent to a contractile phenotype (Campbell et al., 1992; Kinsella et al., 2003). Transgenic mice harboring a deletion of exon 3 (= 3). [H] mRNA expression of from SMCs and ECs. mRNA derived from both cell types was isolated and used to generate cDNA that was amplified using domain-specific primers and electrophoresed on 1% (w/v) agarose gels. PCR products from the GAPDH primer set were electrophoresed on each gel. PCR products for domain I primer sets included exons 3 C 7 (403 bp) and 2 C 7 (510 bp), domain III primer sets included exons 29 C 36 (796 bp) and 35 C 37 (454 bp) and domain V primer sets included exons 87 C 97 (1406 bp) and 87 C 94 (1042 bp). The production of perlecan by SMCs and EC was analyzed by isolating mRNA from each CRLF2 cell type and performing reverse transcriptase PCR (RT-PCR) over 40 cycles. Domain-specific primer sets were designed to Camostat mesylate span exons 2 C 7 from the N terminus (Domain I), exons 29 C 37 from the laminin-like region of the protein core (Domain III) and exons 87 C 97 from the C-terminus (Domain V) (Table 1). Transcripts generated from mRNA isolated from ECs was used to confirm the presence of transcripts from all three domains and as an indication of successful priming at the expected sizes (Table 1 and Fig. 1H). Transcripts generated from mRNA Camostat mesylate isolated from the SMC were also at the expected sizes. Together these data indicated that SMCs produced transcripts for the perlecan protein core. Table 1 Primers for PCR amplification of HSPG2 cDNA (accession number “type”:”entrez-nucleotide”,”attrs”:”text”:”NM_005529″,”term_id”:”1519243079″,”term_text”:”NM_005529″NM_005529). 0.05) the reactivity of both products with this antibody (Fig. 2C). Hep III digestion of each of the perlecan species also significantly increased ( 0.05) their reactivity with an unsaturated HS stub antibody (3G10) confirming the presence of HS. CS chains were detected on SMC perlecan as shown by reactivity with the antibody, CS56, which reacts with both C-4-S and C-6-S, however CS was not detected on EC perlecan (Fig. 2D). Digestion of the immunopurified SMC and EC perlecan with Case B confirmed that dermatan sulfate was not present as there was no change in reactivity of the CS antibodies (data not shown)..